Messages

1

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 10, 2016, 05:12:55 PM »

Kvom do you have any pin states set in M4

Not sure what that means.

I have seen two things that make me suspicious that Darwin and M4 may have some issues playing nice together.

One issue is that on startup, the charge pump led doesn't illuminate.  I have to cycle the disable/enable  button to turn it on.  I see the leds come on briefly at startup,  but then go off as the lua screens load.

Second issue is that none of the indicators in the M4 diagnostic screen change state.

2

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 10, 2016, 05:03:16 PM »

I've tried so many combinations my eyes are crossed.  

But I did find out a few things from looking at the working M3 config.  First, the output#for the spindle relays (2 and 4) are not pin#s but references to the output#s defines in the other tab.  output# 2 is pin 16.  output# 4 is not enabled and has no pin#, which explains why m4 doesn't do anything.

Second but of info.  When I turn on the spindle in M3 and go to the diagnostic screen, I seen that output 2 is flashing, and pin 16 led is on on as well as 17, but no others.  17 is the charge pump.  When the spindle is not moving, led 16 is not on.

In M4 if I configure 16 as an output signal and enable it, the led stays on all the time.  In addition, any time 16 is active, the fan motor in the VFD enclosure turns on, so I believe that this pin enables the VFD but doesn't effect the motor.  However, since there are no other leds illuminated, I can't see how pin 14 is being used by M3 even if it's configured as the spindle pin.

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 10, 2016, 02:08:46 PM »

Tried the above suggestion.  But spindle doesn't move and when I re-enter the M4 config the spindle mapping to OB1 reverts to none.

I think that if the spindle is configured as a step-dir motor in Darwin, then the Darwin jog function would cause the motor to turn.

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 10, 2016, 11:28:18 AM »

Spent a good amount of time trying things in Mach4, but also comparing with M3.  Some conclusions:

1) The motor relays are required to be activated, but do not themselves control the motor.  Unchecking the box disables the spindle.

2) The spindle is a step-dir motor, but is configured to run only forward, since its dir pin is set to 0.  I never tried to execute a M4 command until now.  Whether a different pin would allow reverse is unknown.  I assume that since pin0 is the dir, the default direction signal is off.  When the spindle is running, the BoB light for pin 14 is on, and off when the spindle is off.

4) M3 has a motor tuning definition for the spindle.  How to replicate this in M4 is a mystery.  I can certainly define motor tuning for motor5 in M4, but how to tell M4 it's the spindle?

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 07, 2016, 09:33:17 PM »

That's basically what I did, except I specified a frequency in the output pin definition.  I'll zero that out and only specify frequencies in the diagnostic page.

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 07, 2016, 07:59:05 PM »

I have tried any number of combinations, but no spindle motion has resulted.  Attached is the M3 configuration.  Looking at it I have thought it's a step-dir motor control with pin 2/3 being dir and pin 14 being step.

In M4 I configured these three output pins with 14 having a 12500 frequency, and 2 and 3 w/o frequency, and then the spindle frew/fwd/rev in M4 outputs.  Then in diagnose/darwin window I tried  various frequency ranges.   No motion.  Looking for ideas.

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 04, 2016, 04:03:21 PM »

I don't see any Darwin pages with min/max frequencies.

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Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 04, 2016, 03:40:16 PM »

The axis travels seem to match commands, so it is on to the spindle.  After searching this thread and looking at the M3 spindle config, I tried the following.

Set output signals 5-7 as spindle freg, spindle fwd, spindle rev, pins 14, 2, 4 respectively.  Set frequency to 1800 on pin 14.  FWIW, it seems that output signals 1-4 have charge pump locked as their name, and any names specified for others are not saved to the profile until M4 is stopped and restarted.

Set the input signals for Spindle On, Spindle Fwd, and Spindle Rev to device Darwin and the respective signals.

However spindle does not turn on.   History states that Signal 5 turns ion and off.

9

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 04, 2016, 01:25:45 PM »

Now I found the Keyboard Enable button on the Jog tab, and I can jog with the keyboard!

If I can get the spindle configured next I may be good to go.  In the meantime I've copied the motor tuning params from M3 and will use a DTI to see if the axis movements are still accurate.

10

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 Printer Port Discussions

« on: May 04, 2016, 12:34:20 PM »

More progress.  Seems exiting the Darwin Configuration leaves the BOB in a stopped state, with its leds out.  However, pressing enable-disable-enable turns them on again.

I also found that I can jog in M4 with the jog window buttons, so now my next problem is why the keyboard keys don't work.